However, the Chinese and U.S. numbers all remain above 50.0, which indicates expansion.

In Europe, Spain, Italy, France and Greece all posted modest increases in their PMIs. However, they are all in contractionary territory.

The big story out of Europe is certainly Germany, whose PMI tumbled sharply into contractionary territory.

PMI

At the beginning of each month, Markit, HSBC, RBC, JP Morgan and several other major data gathering institutions publish the latest local readings of the manufacturing purchasing managers index (PMI) for countries around the world.

PMI is one of the best leading indicators of the economy.

Each reading is based on surveys of hundreds of companies. Read more about it at Markit.